Two standard form factors employed by many large computer systems today are a multi-blade system and a multi-drawer electronics rack system. In a multi-blade system, multiple blades (each containing for example, multiple electronics components such as processor modules, memory, and power and hard drive devices) are operatively positioned within a blade chassis, with individual blades being removable and replaceable in the field without affecting operation of the remaining blades. Similarly, in a rack mount environment, one or more electronics drawers of the electronics rack may be removed and/or replaced in the field without affecting operation of the remaining electronics drawers.
One restriction on the blade center and electronics rack configurations is that the entire blade or drawer must be operatively disengaged and removed in order to, for example, replace a particular component within the blade or drawer.